Editorial: Moving capital won't solve South's problems

The Nevada Capitol in Carson City is seen through the trees surrounding it. Every few years talk of moving the capital to Las Vegas arises, and usually disappears just as quickly.
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If the Nevada Legislature decides to move the state capital south — don't bet on it; the odds against it happening are long — it would be first time any state has changed capitals in more than 100 years.

In 1910, Oklahoma moved its capital from Guthrie, the last capital of the Oklahoma Territory and a town with population just north of 10,000 in 2010, to Oklahoma City, a city with a population of nearly 600,000 today.

Not since then, has a state picked up its seat of government — as well as its bureaucrats and domed capitols — and set it down somewhere else.

The reasons for the last century of stability (there had been considerable movement in the 1700s and 1800s, and nearly every state has changed capitals at least once) are pretty simple: It's expensive and representatives of the about-to-be-abandoned city wouldn't go quietly.

Carson residents rest easy

That's why the residents of Carson City can rest easy — the capital, and Capitol, of Nevada aren't going anywhere in the foreseeable future, certainly not the 425 miles to Las Vegas. The state has enough trouble funding critical programs without spending money on moving vans, too.

Nor would moving the capital solve the problem that the Southern Nevada politicians who raise the issue every few years hope it would solve: Southern Nevada's perceived lack of political clout in the Northern Nevada halls of government.

After all, it's not because the capital is in Carson City that three of the state's six constitutional officers — governor, lieutenant governor, secretary of state, attorney general, state treasurer and state controller — are from Northern Nevada.

Nor is it because three of the six constitutional officers are from Northern Nevada that the extension of Interstate 580 (U.S. 395) from the Mount Rose Highway to Washoe Valley was completed while the much-ballyhooed Interstate 11, which would connect Phoenix, Ariz., with Las Vegas (and eventually Mexico to Canada) remains on the drawing board. I-580, in the works for decades, was ready to go when the federal government came looking for "shovel ready" projects; I-11 was still a dream, a dream that depends mostly of Arizona's wishes, not those of Nevada.

And it certainly isn't because the state's bureaucrats, including legislative policy analysts, live in the Reno-Carson City-Gardnerville corridor that the priorities of Southern Nevada interests don't always come out of the legislative grist mill looking quite like they did at the beginning of the session.

Not much regional voting

As David F. Damore, associate professor in the department of political science at the University of Nevada-Las Vegas, explained in a December report for Brookings Mountain West, there actually isn't much regional voting in the Nevada Legislature. Damore analyzed votes during the 2013 session of the Nevada Legislature on a handful of priorities of the Las Vegas Metro Chamber of Commerce and found that not every lawmaker from Southern Nevada agreed with the chamber's take on the issues.

Damore suggests that that's a problem, and the Las Vegas Sun, in a recent editorial headlined "The North just doesn't get it" (the editorial blamed the late-State Sen. Bill Raggio, R-Reno, for most of what ails the South) seemed to agree. Others might see the lack of regional voting in the Legislature as a sign of maturity in a state where rural interests controlled the Legislature long after their economic clout faded.

The fact is that on most issues the interests of North, South and rural counties are aligned. We all, in Nevada, want a first-class educational system, both K-12 and higher education, and we all know we've got long way to go. Those of us in the North don't want a successful University of Nevada, Reno, to come at the expense of UNLV (except, perhaps, on the football field); why would anyone in the South want UNLV's success to come at the expense of UNR?

On the other hand, if UNLV wants to build a football stadium that will also attract major events to Las Vegas, that's of little interest outside of Clark County.

So the key to getting Southern Nevada's priorities through the Legislature isn't moving the capital and all its accoutrements. It's reaching a consensus among Southern Nevada lawmakers on what those priorities should be. If history any indication, that could be a lot harder than moving the capital.

SNAPSHOT

ISSUE:

Regional political tensions in Nevada

OUR VIEW:

The South's failures at the Legislature are the result of lack of a consensus among Clark County lawmakers, not a power play by the North.